Italian MP blacks up during racist rant in parliament

Gianluca Buonanno began his speech with a tirade against immigrants (Picture: YouTube)

An Italian MP has ‘blacked-up’ during an anti-immigration rant in the country’s parliament.

Gianluca Buonanno, a politician with the right-wing Northern League party, began smearing his face during a tirade about benefits he said were being received by immigrants.

Brandishing a pad of black greasepaint, Mr Buonanno said: ‘At the end of the day, maybe in this country in order to achieve anything we need to be a bit darker.

‘I say we can all put make-up on and make ourselves a bit darker, and then we can all go around painted black and say we want the same help that non-EU citizens get.

‘I think that Italians, on top of going to police stations and declaring themselves political refugees, they have to darken themselves, and go around saying that I need help too, and we will see whether Italy is as good to Italians as it is to foreigners.

He then began to apply greasepaint to his face (Picture: YouTube)

‘No more benevolence, let’s give concrete help to those who need it first and foremost.’

He also condemned the policies of a government that contains Italy’s first black member of cabinet, the minister for integration Cecile Kyenge.

‘This is inverted racism. No more benevolence, let’s give concrete help to those who need it first and foremost.’

As mayor of the northern Piedmont town of Varallo Sesia, Mr Buonanno once banned Muslim women from wearing the body-concealing swimsuit known as a burkini.

Buonanno once tried to enter a court dressed in a burqa (Picture: YouTube)

He was also embroiled in a legal battle with the authorities in 2013 after he put up a billboard banning women from wearing the burqa and niqab.

In November he attempted to enter a court wearing a burqa to highlight his case

Last summer Northern League leader, the high-profile senator Roberto Calderoli, sparked outrage by comparing Ms Kyenge to an orangutan.

Despite apologising to Ms Kyenge, in November, he was charged by the country’s prosecutor’s office with defamation aggravated by racial discrimination.